Along with Melbourne's other Victorian era arcade, the nearby Block Arcade, it is a tourist icon of the city, and forms part of the network of lanes and arcades in the CBD.
Designed by Charles Webb, who won a competition in 1868, it was formally opened by the Lord Mayor of the City of Melbourne on 2 May, 1870.[4]
The arcade interior features a high glass roof supported on cast iron frames, and elegant bow fronted shopfronts, with arched windows to the storerooms above each shop. It originally featured central hanging lamps, flat shopfronts, a slate floor, and a fountain at the south end. One of the south end shops was occupied by a Turkish Bath.[4]
The arcade's most famous features were added in 1893; at the south end, the carved mythical figures of Gog and Magog (based on those in London's Guildhall) flank the large 'Gaunt's clock', which triggers the arms of the figures to strike bells each hour.[5] At the north end a figure of Father Time was also added. [6][7][8][9] Gaunt was Melbourne's best known clock-maker at the time.
The shopfronts were all changed into bow fronted windows in 1890-1894, and in 1902, further alteration saw the creation of the large arched niche at the south end, and an extension was added to the west side through to Elizabeth Street. The shopfronts later altered again, creating a continuous line of widows forward of the original line, various central kiosks were added, and the black and white chequered marble floor was laid in 1934.[10] In the 1950s, a connection was created to the short Hub Arcade to the west on Little Collins Street. In later decades some shopfronts were altered again, and a range of signage introduced. In the 1920s the cast iron verandah on Bourke Street was replaced by a cantilevered one, but was recreated in simpler form in the 1990s.
In 2002-04 a major refurbishment and restoration included the recreation the 1894 shopfronts, bringing a consistency to the shopfronts once more, and the facade was repainted in a yellow and white colour scheme, with gilded highlights.[2]
1 2 "The Royal Arcade". Argus (Melbourne, Vic.: 1848 - 1957). 3 May 1870. p.7. Retrieved 26 March 2019.
↑ "GOG and MAGOG". Herald (Melbourne, Vic.: 1861 - 1954). 3 April 1937. p.36. Retrieved 26 March 2019.
↑ "Melbourne Gossip". The Bendigo Independent. 30 May 1893. Retrieved 3 October 2016.
↑ The figures are said to be based on the 1708 figures in the Guildhall in London, but their use as figures to strike the time may have been inspired by another carved pair of Gog and Magog erected on the outside of Bennett's Clock Shop in Cheapside by 1891, which also struck the hour and included a figure of Father Time. The lower part of the shop complete with the figures are now part of the Henry Ford Museum, Dearborn, Michigan
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